TX BIOS:  Clint Padgitt, McLennan Co. TX
   Selected and converted.American Memory, Library of Congress.
   
   Washington, 1994.
   
   Preceding element provides place and date of transcription only.
   
   This transcription intended to be 99.95% accurate.
   
   For more information about this text and this American Memory
   collection, refer to accompanying matter.
   
   U.S. Work Projects Administration, Federal Writers' Project (Folklore
   Project, Life Histories, 1936-39); Manuscript Division, Library of
   Congress.Copyright status not determined.
   
   00011
   
   FOLKLORE
   
   William V. Ervin, P. W.
   
   McLennan County, Texas.
   
   District No. 8 Life history Pioneer History
   
   No. words 800
   
   File No. 240
   
   Page No. 1 Reference
   
   Consultant - Clint Padgitt, Padgitt Co., Franklin and 5th Sts., Waco,
   Texas.
   
   My grandfather was Captain Shapley P. Ross. In 1849 he built a cabin
   on the bank of the Brazos river near Waco Spring. He and other of the
   older members of the family told me as a boy of the things the people
   did in the pioneer days.
   
   My grandfather was in bed with the measles about the year 1850, as
   well as I recall, when one day a band of Comanche Indians was seen
   coming to the house. My grandfather told my grandmother that the
   Indians would probably kill him and take her and the two little boys
   captives, and if they did, for her to take a cloth with her and tear
   pieces of it off and drop them [as?] they went along, and the settlers
   would find them and possibly find her. The chief came to the door and
   started in, but when he saw grandfather lying there in bed with the
   measles broken out on his face the Indian was afraid of him, and did
   not come in. He told grandmother that they wanted beef and
   watermelons, and to send the boys to show them where the beef and
   melons were. The boys went with the Indians, and their parents never
   expected to see them alive again, but they came back all right. The
   Indians took the meat and melons and went on without molesting the
   family any further. The Indians were superstitious about sick people
   and of course knew enough to know that what grandfather had they might
   get and spread it through the tribe.
   
     NOTE: C12 - [?] - Texas
     
   About twenty-five years later grandfather was at the Dallas Fair, and
   saw a band of Indians which were there on exhibition. When he came to
   them, one of them spoke to him and told him that he remembered his as
   the sick man, that it was his band which had come to grandfather's
   house that day. The Indian told him that they admired the boys very
   much for their bravery in going with the Indians. 00022In the early
   Fifties my grandfather killed a Comanche Chief known as Bigfoot, who
   was one of the greatest chiefs of that tribe and the most powerful one
   at the time of his death. The story of the fight during which
   grandfather killed the chief is told in Wilbarger's Indian
   Depredations in Texas. About two years after the fight one evening
   when Placedore, a former chief of the [Tonkawa?] tribe, and who was a
   faithful friend of grandfathers; was sitting on the front porch a
   Comanche came to the house and said he wished to see Captain Ross.
   Placedore told him to leave, that Captain Ross did not wish to see
   him. The Comanche then said, "I am a brother of Bigfoot, who Captain
   Ross killed. My brother was a very great man, but Captain Ross killed
   him, and he is a greater man, then, than my brother. I wish to live
   with Captain Ross because he is a great man." Placedore again told him
   to leave, that they did not want him there. Captain Ross came up then.
   Placedore said not to allow the Comanche to stay, that he meant
   treachery and would probably kill the captain. The Comanche said he
   would prove that he would be faithful. He went to a mesquite tree
   growing in the yard and cut a thorn three or four inches long. He took
   a fold of his flesh over his stomach and thrust the thorn through it,
   then with his knife out off the ends of the thorn. Placedore and
   grandfather knew then that the Comanche would be faithful as that was
   the Indian way of proving loyalty. He was allowed to remain, and
   stayed with grandfather ten years. I do not now remember the
   Comanche's name. This occurred about the year 1855.
   
   My mother, Kate Ross was supposed to be the first white girl born in
   Waco. My uncle, Robert S. Ross, was/ thought the first white child
   born in McLennan county. He was born under a tree on what is now the
   Price Standifer farm, before the cabin grandfather was building was
   completed.
   
   I remember my mother telling me that when she was a little girl, in
   the early Fifties, great herds of buffalo would come to Waco, which
   was then only a village of scattered houses among fields of corn and
   other crops. The buffalo 00033would come toward Waco from the north on
   their migration to the south, and would, if not turned, go right
   through the village and the fields and destroy all the crops. When the
   buffalo were seen coming the alarm would be given by shouting, "Here
   come the buffalo", and ringing a bell. Then all the people would stop
   what they were doing and go north of the town in their wagons and make
   a line of the wagons around the town. They would take guns, dishpans
   and anything else they could make a noise with, and turn the buffalo
   around the town and the crops. Then for a day or two the men would
   shoot what buffalo they wanted for their winter supply of meat.
   
   There was a flat-bottomed steamboat called the "Katie Ross" after my
   mother, which ran up and down the Brazos from Waco carrying supplies
   to settlements along the river. This was about 1860. I don't remember
   who it was owned the steamboat.
   
   Along during the Seventies men who were [fleet?] of foot would go from
   settlement to settlement and challenge anybody to a footrace, and
   those racers and the people of the settlements would bet on the races.
   One of these men was called Deerfoot, which was probably a nickname,
   as he was very fast and had beaten every man who ran against him. He
   and the men with him come to Waco and said they had $2,500 in gold
   which they would bet that Deerfoot could beat any man in Waco. The
   citizens made up a purse of $2,500, to bet on a man they considered
   could beat Deerfoot. All this money, $5,000, was piled on a blanket.
   The Waco man way outran Deerfoot. After that the man from Waco ran
   other races and always won.
   
   There used to be a racetrack in the Seventies where Oakwood cemetary
   now stands. There are still in trees in and the cemetary rings which
   were used for tying horses. Lots of people now wonder what those rings
   were for. In 1875 there was a man wanted to make a record for the
   shortest time carrying mail twenty miles by riding around the
   racetrack. He wore out the horse he started with, then he used all his
   horses one after another, and then the 00044people got so interested
   in seeing him make a record that they took their horses from their
   wagons and buggies and also let have their saddle horses to ride so he
   could break the record.

************************************************************************
USGENWEB ARCHIVES NOTICE:  These electronic pages may NOT be reproduced 
in any format for profit or presentation by any other organization or
persons.  Persons or organizations desiring to use this material, must
obtain the written consent of the contributor, or the legal representative
of the submitter, and contact the listed USGenWeb archivist with proof of
this consent. The submitter has given permission to the USGenWeb Archives
to store the file permanently for free access.

http://www.usgwarchives.net/

Thanks to the Library of Congress
http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/wpaintro/txcat.html
***********************************************************************